B. found merely intellectual parties too quiet for him. Else,
what young man in his senses could refuse such entertainment and
instruction?
CHAPTER VIII
Mrs. Newcome at Home (a Small Early Party)
To push on in the crowd, every male or female struggler must use his
shoulders. If a better place than yours presents itself just beyond your
neighbour, elbow him and take it. Look how a steadily purposed man or
woman at court, at a ball, or exhibition, wherever there is a competition
and a squeeze, gets the best place; the nearest the sovereign, if bent on
kissing the royal hand; the closest to the grand stand, if minded to go
to Ascot; the best view and hearing of the Rev. Mr. Thumpington, when all
the town is rushing to hear that exciting divine; the largest quantity of
ice, champagne, and seltzer, cold pate, or other his or her favourite
flesh-pot, if gluttonously minded, at a supper whence hundreds of people
come empty away. A woman of the world will marry her daughter and have
done with her; get her carriage and be at home and asleep in bed; whilst
a timid mamma has still her girl in the nursery, or is beseeching the
servants in the cloakroom to look for her shawls, with which some one
else has whisked away an hour ago.
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